World

Ukraine Government Claims Control of Airport; Up to 50 Separatists Are Killed

A wounded pro-Russian insurgent lies on the ground during Monday's battle at the Donetsk airport.

Image: Evgeny Feldman, Mashable

By Jim Roberts and Christopher Miller 2014-05-27 11:03:17 UTC

Donetsk, Ukraine May 27

A pro-Russian militiaman is seen aiming his Kalashnikov assault rifle through a barricade in Donetsk on May 27, 2014.

Image: Evgeny Feldman, Mashable

A pro-Russian separatist stands behind a barricade in Donetsk on May 27, 2014.

Image: Evgeny Feldman, Mashable

A woman fills a bag with the sand for barricade construction.

Image: Evgeny Feldman, Mashable

A militiaman holds his Kalashnikov, which is decorated with St.George ribbon and Russian flag-colored tape.

Image: Evgeny Feldman, Mashable

Locals in Donetsk sit at a bus stop while separatists construct the barricade.

Image: Evgeny Feldman, Mashable

A pro-Russian separatist helps prepare a barricade while holding the RPG.

Image: Evgeny Feldman, Mashable

Donetsk locals explore the Kamaz truck that was destroyed in an accident on Monday. The truck was reportedly carrying pro-Russian separatists, all of whom died.

Image: Evgeny Feldman, Mashable

A pro-Russia supporter prepares a barricade while another man aims an RPG hand-held anti-tank grenade launcher.

Image: Evgeny Feldman, Mashable

Billbord advertising Ukrainian magazine New Times is seen in front of the barricade being constructed in Donetsk.

Image: Evgeny Feldman, Mashable

UPDATED: 4:20 p.m. ET

Warning: This story contains very graphic content.

Ukraine's government said Tuesday it had retaken control of the airport in Donetsk after a bloody battle with pro-Russian separatists that left at least 30 insurgent fighters dead.

Mashable correspondent Christopher J. Miller was in the Donetsk morgue earlier in the day and reported seeing "seriously mangled" bodies of insurgent fighters. He said the head of the morgue gave a death toll of 33 fighters and two civilians. But separatists leaders said about 50 militants died in the fighting.

An elderly woman was one of two civilians who was killed after she caught in the crossfire of fighting between government troops and pro-Russian insurgents.

Image: Evgeny Feldman, Mashable

At the morgue, there were at least a dozen workers, one investigator and about a dozen rebels standing guard with pistols and Kalashnikovs. Some 20 journalists showed up after Mashable arrived. The morgue reeked of death and formaldehyde as at least 30 bodies were hastily piled atop each other in a corner.

In the Donetsk morgue, a pile of bodies was stacked in a corner. More than 30 pro-Russian separatists died during Monday's battle.

Interior Minister Arsen Avakov said in a statement: "The airport is under our full control. The enemy suffered heavy losses. We have none."

The lead investigator at the morgue in Donetsk identified one of the dead separatist gunmen as being a resident of Crimea, which Russia annexed from Ukraine earlier in the year. That annexation was set in motion by the takeover of a key airport by pro-Russian gunmen, similar to the situation in Donetsk.

Despite the government's claim of control, fighting continued into the late afternoon near the airport.

And judging from scenes on the streets, it appears that the pro-Russian militants were gearing up to fight again; Miller reports seeing vans with rebel fighters carrying anti-tank weapons. Otherwise, the streets of Donetsk were largely empty, with many citizens afraid to leave their homes.

Ukrainian officials also reported Tuesday that border guards had captured three vehicles filled with rocket-propelled grenade launchers and explosives that had illegally crossed into the eastern Ukrainian region of Luhansk from Russia. The vehicles were part of a larger column of trucks, cars and microbuses moving toward the village of Astakhov, the Border Guard Service said in a statement.

As the vehicles closed in on the border guards, a gun battle erupted, the Border Guard Service said. One gunman from the convoy was seriously wounded as a result. Amid the chaos one group of vehicles escaped to the west and deeper into Ukrainian territory.

The report, however, contrasted with that of Ukraine's parliament. It said the "terrorists" fled back to Russia, adding that "five fighters were disarmed, and one was taken prisoner."

The battle over the airport began only hours after Ukraine elected a new president, Petro Poroshenko. Pro-Russian fighters took over the terminal before dawn on Monday, and government troops launched an all out assault with fighter jets and paratroopers later in the afternoon.

The ferocity of the government's counterattack conformed with the words of President-elect Poroshenko, who in his first post-election press conference said: “I am not going to hold any dialogues with the criminals. You don’t talk to terrorists. The anti-terrorist operation will not and cannot last for months, it will last just for hours.”

In Moscow, Russia's Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said a "real war" was under way in the Russian-speaking Ukrainian regions of Donetsk and Luhansk and called on Poroshenko to halt military operations there.

The battle between government troops and the separatists who seized the airport appeared to cause significant damage to the main terminal building, as this video shows.

First Deputy Prime Minister Vitaliy Yarema, addressing fears that Ukraine's government might declare a state of emergency in the country's restive east, ensured that authorities had control over the situation.

"There are no reasons today to introduce a state of emergency. The anti-terrorist operation has already reached its turning point," Yarema told reporters in Kiev after a Ukrainian cabinet meeting on Tuesday, Interfax-Ukraine news agency reported.

The pro-Russia rebels in the southeast of Ukraine "have already realized that making the Ukrainian army angry is tantamount to being one's own enemy. They already had the chance to feel that during yesterday's fighting at the Donetsk airport," he added.

Yarema said the counter-terrorism operation would take on a new form after president-elect Poroshenko is sworn in.

"I know that after the president assumes duties the operation will rise to a totally different qualitative level. Petro Poroshenko is the person who has assumed political responsibility for the situation in Ukraine, for order and for peace which must come to the east after all," Yarema said. "Taking his ambitions into account, as well as pledges given to the Ukrainian people, including the election pledges, I have no doubts that we will restore order in the east of Ukraine quickly."

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